Suspected Cyberattack Closes Northern Essex Community College

Northern Essex Community College will remain closed today in the wake of a network outage that officials at the Massachusetts institution suspect was due to a cyberattack. The campus was closed Monday, The Eagle-Tribune of Andover reported.

“Upon learning of this issue, we began working closely with law enforcement and cybersecurity professionals to conduct a forensic investigation,” Melissa Bouse, the Massachusetts college’s public relations director, told the newspaper. “The college took immediate steps to secure its environment and initiate an initial investigation to evaluate the scope of the incident.”

Late Monday, Northern Essex released a statement saying that it would remain closed today but expected to open for business Wednesday. College officials said that remote work would be suspended for the rest of the week and said employees should stop using work-provided laptops until forensics can be performed and security software installed on them. All web-based services are functioning once again, the college said.